{"id":470792,"date":"2025-09-16T21:15:38","date_gmt":"2025-09-16T21:15:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=470792"},"modified":"2025-09-16T23:15:49","modified_gmt":"2025-09-16T23:15:49","slug":"home-alone-quirk-in-tiny-clubs-champions-league-fairytale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=470792","title":{"rendered":"Home Alone quirk in tiny club's Champions League fairytale"},"content":{"rendered":"

Little-known Belgian club \ufeffUnion Saint-Gilloise have made a stunning Champions League<\/a> debut by upsetting Dutch giants PSV Eindhoven 3-1<\/a> in a feisty group match in the Netherlands on Wednesday (AEST).<\/p>\n

Union won the Belgian title for the first time in 90 years last season to qualify for Europe's top flight and have had to fight their way back from the domestic fourth division.<\/p>\n

The triumph was a truly international collaboration for a fairytale club whose home ground holds only 9400 fans.<\/p>\n

Football's<\/strong><\/em> new home, Stan Sport<\/strong><\/em><\/a>, is the only place to watch the Premier League, UEFA Champions League, FA Cup, WSL, European World Cup qualifiers, J.League, NSWL and K League<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

\"R.<\/p>\n

Union are captained by England's former League Two centre back Christian Burgess and the goals were scored by Canada's \ufeffPromise David, Belgium's Anouar Ait El Hadj and Argentina's Kevin Mac Allister.<\/p>\n

David converted \ufeffan early penalty, El Hadj ran half the length of the pitch to score a cracking goal and Mac Allister bundled home the third with his knees from a corner.<\/p>\n

Mac Allister is the older brother of Liverpool star Alexis and was named after Macaulay Culkin's character in Home Alone<\/em>.<\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Aussie hangs on for bronze in thrilling world champs finish<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

\ufeffREAD MORE:<\/strong> Konstas blasts quickfire ton for Australia A<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

READ MORE:<\/strong> Two female jockeys investigated over 'white powder' videos<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

\"Anouar<\/p>\n

The now 27-year-old only found out this fact when he was 18.\ufeff<\/p>\n

PSV grabbed a last minute consolation through new signing Ruben van Bommel – the son of former Netherlands standout Mark van Bommel – but it failed to put any gloss on a miserable night for the Dutch champions.<\/p>\n

David's penalty was awarded when United States international Ricardo Pepi harshly landed his boot into the leg of Burgess.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/x.com\/StanSportFC\/status\/1967876361751769293<\/a><\/p>\n

Goalkeeper Matej Kovar then went the wrong way on the spot kick in the ninth minute.<\/p>\n

Another error by Pepi led to Union's second before the break, a dribbling exhibition and expert finish by El Hadj.<\/p>\n

Union are one of four clubs making their competition debuts this season.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/x.com\/UnionStGilloise\/status\/1968041406062268572<\/a><\/p>\n

The others are Bod\u00f8\/Glimt (from Norway), Kairat (Kazakhstan) and Pafos (Cyprus).<\/p>\n

PSV had gone unbeaten in their previous 11 group or league matches in UEFA competition.<\/p>\n

Elsewhere, Arsenal\ufeff's substitutes were decisive in a 2-0 win at Athletic Bilbao.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/x.com\/StanSportFC\/status\/1968028748730732955<\/a><\/p>\n

Gabriel Martinelli scored less than a minute after he came on and Leandro Trossard doubled the lead 15 minutes later.<\/p>\n

Martinelli and Trossard also provided the assists on each other's goals.<\/p>\n

The top eight teams advance to the round of 16.<\/p>\n

The next 16 teams enter a two-legged playoff, with eight advancing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Little-known Belgian club \ufeffUnion Saint-Gilloise have made a stunning Champions League debut by upsetting Dutch giants PSV Eindhoven 3-1 in a feisty group match in […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":470794,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/470792"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=470792"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/470792\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":470797,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/470792\/revisions\/470797"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/470794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=470792"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=470792"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=470792"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}